Mutual housing models evolved during the twentieth century and included housing co-operatives, tenant-led housing associations and other charitable entities. Newer models have emerged in recent years also based on forms of mutualism, such as co-housing and Community Land Trusts. This chapter will explore specifically the cooperative origins of self-managed social housing through the top-down efforts of support by municipal and philanthropic endeavours, as well as bottom-up efforts. The co-operative and mutual origins of self-managed housing was linked also to the emergence of building clubs or societies, and the early tenant-led models of housing co-operatives, which then influenced the wider co-operative movement in the UK. The historical perspective pursued in this chapter will allow for a more granular understanding of the different forms of mutual housing that have been used and to what extent they relied on external institutional support as well as self-governed adaptations in the context of the UK.